Romain Grosjean labels his seventh-place finish at last weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix “beautiful”, especially after the Lotus driver had to recover from a terrible start.
Starting from 10th after pulling out a “miracle lap” in qualifying, the Frenchman dropped down to 16th on the opening lap but managed to fight his way back into points contention, though he was among the drivers who got penalised in a drama-filled event at Budapest.
“I think it was an incredible race; it was an incredible weekend,” said Grosjean. “Being in the top ten in qualifying yesterday was a miracle and the race was actually beautiful; we really pushed hard and it was good, we deserved some points.
“I had a terrible start, lost a lot of places and was pushed into the gravel by Carlos Sainz on the first lap. Then I came back on track and couldn’t pass the McLaren. Then there was a penalty for an unsafe release and then the Safety Car. But we got the strategy right and, after all that, we ended up in P7 fighting with the Mercedes.”
Meanwhile, team-mate Pastor Maldonado experienced a torrid afternoon at the Hungaroring, with the Venezuelan having to serve no less than three penalties: first for overtaking Will Stevens’ Manor under the Safety Car, then for speeding in the pit lane, and finally for causing a collision with Sergio Perez’ Force India.
“It was tough race and the Stewarts were certainly very strict today, very tough on driving with me and many other drivers,” said Maldonado. “I struggled at the start as our strategy was to run with the harder tyres, but then the strategy was working well with the softer tyres until the penalties affected our race.
With Sergio Perez around the outside of me it felt like a racing incident to me; there was nothing intentional in the contact.”
The two Lotus drivers were also handed a couple of penalty points on their super licences after the race. This means that both Grosjean and Maldonado have now lost half of their 12-point allocation.
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